


be my demon

by orphan_account



Category: SF9 (Band)
Genre: Angst, Demon AU, Enemies to Lovers, Fluff, M/M, Musicians, PINING..., Pining, Slow Burn, chorus!taeyang, demon!chani, demons!youngbin/inseong, drummer!dawon, musicians!rowoon/juho/jaeyoon, rochan is like completely platonic they maybe kiss once
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-09-18
Packaged: 2019-07-13 23:54:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16028639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Chanhee lets his eyes graze over to the file. It looks rather empty, and it’s absent of a class stamp. In fact, the entire folder itself is peculiarly bare, sporting nothing but the human’s name: Kim Seokwoo, and a sticky note that says nothing buttagged for chanhee.The file contains only a few pages. Despite being impossibly empty inside, there’s a cover page, thankfully, complete with a picture of the subject and basic information. Chanhee skims over it all somewhat carelessly - why should he care about the human’s criminal record, they’re reaching out to a fuckingdemon- but there are a few columns that stick out.For one, Kim Seokwoo is young. Younger than any of the subjects Chanhee’s been given before, undoubtedly. He has quite a few friends and is attending one of the top universities in the district. But next to his request, it sayswants a demon to kill someone for him. **Ask Chanhee





	be my demon

**Author's Note:**

> before we begin i just wanna thank u for reading this and i hope it lives up to ur expectations
> 
> this was originally supposed to be a ptg fic but then the whole cube/edawn/hyuna thing happened and i realized that the sf9 section of ao3 is kind of ...... _bare_ except for like collab fics and nsfw so i figured why not. i'm not sure how long this is gonna be, i'm aiming towards like 8-9 chapters but i didn't say anything for sure because who knows with my brain and the way i get attached to characters
> 
> until next time UWU !! have a nice day

Seokwoo has an itch.

If one with a realist mind was to place a musician and a grandfather clock side by side, they wouldn’t see any similarity. If a dreamer was to cut both open, it would become apparent that both have more to them than flesh and bone and metal gears. 

See, they both run through a consistent mentality. It’s standard routine: a clock tells the time, a musician speaks of song written a million years ago by some dead guy in the ground. There are lines that hold the notes together, and fingers that hold the timeframes to designated points. And both cycle through these lifelines, permanently, until those gears stop working.

Seokwoo’s grandmother once said that when a musician dies, there is a single string that pops from an angel’s harp. At her funeral, as he handed his mother a tissue, Seokwoo found himself glancing to the sky and wondering how many harp strings that would account for in total now that another spirit had joined the mix.

When a clock stops working, it’s either fixed or thrown away. Seokwoo doesn’t know what happens to harps when a string snaps, but he’s always guessed that it’s somewhat of a similar result. Of course, he doesn’t know how heaven works, or how angels fix their harps, or if there are even enough strings on a harp to account for all the missing souls in the world.

Simply put, Kim Seokwoo has an itch. 

Two itches, to be precise. His first is his deepest, rooted flush to his ribs after his father takes him to a cello recital for his sixth birthday and he watches Brandenburg Concerto No. 4 haunt a woman through her fingertips.

His second is Baek Juho.

*

(Two weeks ago on a Thursday, the conductor pulls Seokwoo aside after rehearsal.

The rest of his class is filing out slowly, a few remaining to collect their bags. The conductor’s breath smells like the tuna sandwich he’d been eating twenty minutes before, but he’s quite honestly the most eccentric, kindest man in the world so Seokwoo says nothing.

“I think you should select a piece with a piano accompanist,” he says to Seokwoo. Then, he quickly adds, __not because I don’t think you’re talented enough to complete this recital on your own, but because judges may critique you less harshly if there’s somebody there to tie the loose ends together.__

“Maybe I want them to critique me harshly,” Seokwoo says back.

It’s a bold lie. When Seokwoo was fifteen, he failed an audition and didn’t touch his cello for eight months. In the art of music, there’s stumbling and there’s falling, and tight critiques are just the fine, bitter line in between. Seokwoo has hated the sensation of falling since he bruised his knees in first grade.

His conductor knows this. Of course he does: he’s the one who selected Seokwoo for this recital, after all, amongst twenty other musicians. According to the dean, he has a talent of finding the kids whose veins fill with moondust at the sound of the first few notes. This is why he shakes his head, smiles fondly, and wordlessly opens up the attendance book.

There are a select few pianists in the class. Seokwoo’s close friends with Jaeyoon, who broke his left hand two days before a recital and still showed up to play, sporting a clunky brace that the doctor had advised to keep still. There’s Youngkyun, who kept to himself until he got drunk at a party two weeks into freshman year and played La Campanella with his eyes closed. 

Then there’s Baek Juho, who’s tall and rude and condescending, and at first Seokwoo doesn’t understand why the conductor is tapping his student picture. __He has good stage presence,__ he’s telling Seokwoo, who feels dread like a livewire in his skin. 

“I will not do my piece with Juho,” Seokwoo deadpans, staring at Juho’s monochrome features like he’s bound to leap from the page. “We hate each other. You do know we hate each other, right? It’ll be a disaster. He’ll try to overpower my cello.”

“That right there,” the conductor finalizes as he slams the notebook shut, “is the energy that the judges will be looking for.”)

*

The first time Seokwoo and Juho practice together, the room is completely silent. 

Although Seokwoo wouldn’t call it _practicing_. In order to do that, there would have to be some degree of physical movement, or even a few stray notes drifting through the air. When Seokwoo wanders into the music room, Juho is resting his elbows against the polished wood, cover drawn tightly over the keys. 

“We do have to play, eventually, you know,” Seokwoo tells him. He’s sitting facing the whiteboard, cello slung across his legs. Someone’s added _the naruto opening_ under the list of requested recital pieces. If Seokwoo squints, it kind of looks like Jaeyoon’s handwriting. “We can’t just sit here watching the wall.”

“I’m not watching the wall.” There’s the sound of a bag rustling somewhere behind Seokwoo, and then loud crunching as Juho bites down around a handful of Takis. “I’m watching videos on my phone.”

“We have to _practice._ ”

“I don’t have to do shit. The only reason I agreed to this is because the conductor told me that judges might be scouting pianists.”

Seokwoo sighs, slumping back in his seat. If it were anybody else, Seokwoo would bitch until his mouth fell off. But it’s Baek Juho, who poured water into Hyunggu’s tuba because he told Juho his shirt was inside out. Baek Juho, who hid Hani’s viola before a recital because she flipped her hair and accidentally hit him in the face. Baek Juho, who tripped Kim Seokwoo in the hallway because he was quite literally running late to Psychology.

Baek Juho, who heard Seokwoo telling one of the percussionists that he’s a manipulative trust fund baby and has hated him ever since.

Baek Juho, Seokwoo’s accompanist.

*

“I thought you hated Juho.”

Then there’s Yoo Taeyang, the chorus team’s only male soprano. He avoids dairy before any concert and hasn’t touched a slice of bread in ten years. But he has a soft spot for instant noodles, and argues that the sodium doesn’t make him bloated: it makes him cuter.

“I do.” They’re seated outside, their lunch laid out on a checkered blanket. Taeyang has his head in Seokwoo’s lap, eyes skimming over a history textbook but not really reading it. The campus garden is directly beside the auditorium, where band practice occurs every Wednesday. Seokwoo tilts his head against the warm breeze, feels pollen tickle his cheek as he squints up through the branches. “Doesn’t change the fact I have to do my piece with him.”

“Is it going well, at least?”

“He won’t even play.”

Taeyang scoffs. “Your conductor should’ve suggested Youngkyun,” he says. “Tell your conductor you’re changing partners and play La Campanella instead. Hide some scotch under the piano bench. You’ll kill that shit.”

“He says that Juho’s playing pattern matches mine better than the other pianists,” Seokwoo mutters. “How the hell does he figure that? We’ve never spoken a word to each other.”

“Close Juho’s fingers in the piano cover,” Taeyang suggests. “Push him down a flight of stairs.”

“Maybe I’ll just hide the piano itself,” Seokwoo laughs. Maybe his car will break down the night of the recital and Seokwoo will be forced to do it himself. Surely the judges would take pity on him in that case, right?

Something that’s not always apparent is the fact that artistic students have a dark sense of humor. Kim Seokwoo is an honors student, plays four instruments, and makes a joke about death by choking on mashed potatoes when he goes home to a family dinner during Christmas. 

At first, he thinks he’s the only one, but then Youngkyun says that he told his father he was going to bury himself out in the backyard while he waited for Santa. 

This is probably why Taeyang makes a dark joke about killing Juho.

And this is probably why Seokwoo snorts, “yeah, let’s just summon a demon to come kill him.”

*

Halfway through practice one week later, Juho announces he has to leave.

They’ve been sitting in silence for half an hour, but Seokwoo’s managed to squeeze out one line from the score. Of course, their tempo doesn’t match up at all, and Juho gives up six notes in so he can start his algebra homework. Seokwoo’s only a little more than pissed off when Juho starts to pack his things.

“Where are you going?” Seokwoo asks, sounding nothing but accusatory. “We’re in the middle of practice.”

“We’re not even playing,” Juho says coolly, gesturing to where Seokwoo’s abandoned his cello against one of the chairs. Seokwoo’s sitting with his knees pulled to his chest, pencil in hand as he marks up his sheet. “It’s been totally silent for like, forty-five minutes.”

“You’re the one who refuses to play,” Seokwoo snaps, whipping around so his glare hits Juho straight-on. “At least I’ve been trying.”

“If by trying you mean playing out of tune and then whining at me when I try to catch up, then you’re doing a pretty good job.”

“You gave up before we had even done a full rundown of the piece.”

“And now I’m leaving,” Juho concludes, sliding the piano cover down with a sharp click. “I don’t even want to do this, you know? It’s not my fault the conductor thinks you’re too much of a clapped cellist to manage such an elementary piece on your own.”

Seokwoo’s jaw drops. It’s almost humiliating, being spoken down to by one of the top pianists at the university, although he knows that his own spot in the orchestra isn’t one to be jostled with. Seokwoo’s one of the firsts, after all; landed one of the front seats and has remained there throughout the semester-destined rotations. 

Out in the hallway, the lacrosse team is letting out hollers as they return from practice. One of them bangs their fist against a locker and the noise reverberates through the thin walls.

Seokwoo grips his bow between white knuckles, grits out, “that’s not the reason why he asked you.”

“Why, then?” Juho’s hair looks feathery and angelic from where the afternoon light is hitting it. It’s not fair. “Because we both know that I don’t need _your_ help to be singled out in any sort of competition. I’ve done solo pieces by myself before. A cellist needs a pianist, not the other way around.”

There’s not much Seokwoo can argue to that, because a part of it is true. While most pieces sound better with both, it’s typically the strings that desire an accompaniment. He feels rather stupid as he opens his mouth, horribly flustered when no words come out. With a smirk, Juho turns on his heel. He offers no further parting words as he slips out, swinging his backpack over his shoulder. 

Seokwoo’s left breathless, flushed, shaking. He waits until Juho’s slammed the door shut before whipping out his phone. _ok i’m not playing around anymore,_ he texts Taeyang, stomach flipping as he resists the urge to chase the despicable pianist down the hallway. _juho’s a fucking asshol e. im calling upon all the dark spirits to come kill him before i do it myself_

*

Chanhee’s always hated hell.

There’s just something so arbitrary about the concept. When he was alive, he didn’t believe in either heaven nor hell. He figured there was an eternal inbetween of sorts, like the air of finality between two people who very much long for each other but whose souls don’t match the other’s edges.

Of course, there is a purgatory: that’s where Chanhee lingered for a long time after passing. It was a lot quieter than he originally thought it would be, and a whole hell of a lot lonelier. Each corner held the same shade of grey no matter where he wandered to. Like the world of the living, only dipped in absent monochrome. And Chanhee had never seen anybody, living or dead, wandering that world with him.

And there was no sound. Even when he tried to talk to himself, he heard nothing, like his lungs had been torn straight from his body.

After drifting like that for a while, Chanhee remembered that’s exactly what had happened. He had no physical body anymore.

Despite what the majority may think, Chanhee is not a bad person. It wasn’t his soul that deemed him fit for hell. According to higher beings (although he hadn’t seen much of them when he had finally managed to find the gates) he was simply too lazy to be an angel, too unmotivated to file paperwork or assist guardians in the higher offices.

And he’s always hated people. There had been an angel with pretty auburn hair who had said something about how someone had to have some sort of a selfless trait in order to make it in heaven, and Chanhee just hadn’t made the cut.

If he’s honestly speaking, hell isn’t really that bad. Yes, there are the souls that _deserve_ to be there, for inexplicable reasons. They make up most of the population. Those are the ones that scream, that are locked up in little rooms with nothing but their own fears. The ones that burn.

(Chanhee runs into one of them, only once, after they escape from their cell. They have no face because they don’t deserve one. What’s left is the pain and the guilt, and Chanhee feels their anger when they grab his shoulders and beg him to save them. 

He has to take a week off from his duties, locks himself in his room until the panic fades.

Youngbin swears he won’t let it happen again.)

Chanhee isn’t one of those people. He lives upstairs, which he assumes is a weak joke that’s supposed to stand for being closer to heaven (but for him it just stands as an annoying reminder.) The screams are still audible if you listen hard enough, and Chanhee spends a few good nights stomping on the floor until they shut up.

Youngbin is one of the higher demons, although he’s not a horrible person. He bakes cookies for the new souls when they arrive, tells them stories about the quickie he got in a locker room once because apparently, when he was still alive, he played lacrosse.

He’s in hell because he’s clumsy. When they’re close enough, Youngbin tells Chanhee of how he was originally a guardian angel but lost his wings because he accidentally pushed his human down a staircase and broke their neck. 

Apparently, the archangels couldn’t stand the thought of someone as sweet as Youngbin wandering around the earth by himself, doomed to be eternally invisible. So they sent him to hell instead. 

It was thought to be a strong move for him to be a guardian demon, since he’d had experience in the field. Of course, guardian angels and guardian demons are fighting for two different sides, but assisting a human in twisted desires is quite literally a golden deed as opposed to torturing rotten souls. Not to mention, if Youngbin fucks up, hell just turns a blind eye to the human’s file.

One step down from guardian demon is crossroad demon, which the higher-ups stamp on Chanhee’s little _i’m a demon :3_ card, the metaphorical passport into the underworld.

It’s in this sense that he becomes Youngbin’s shadow. When Chanhee first arrives, he asks the most trivial questions. Like, _can demons eat?_ and _do we take turns burning alive? Like, do they spin a wheel and whoever’s name it lands on suffers next?_

The answer to both of those, according to Youngbin, the sweetest demon in the pits of hell, are as follows:

a.) if you want to

b.) are you a fucking idiot, kang chanhee

However, on a particularly bad night, when Chanhee asks him if it’s possible to go back to heaven, Youngbin can offer him nothing but a tight smile and hesitant eyes.

So, to make a long, bleak-ass story short, Chanhee has always hated hell. It’s excruciatingly boring, none of it makes any sense, and it always leaves him exhausted at the end of the day. 

Henceforth, it’s just another one of those weeks when Chanhee is in the middle of closing a file as Inseong drops another on his desk. He’s not sure how guardian angels categorize their humans, but in hell, each file is stamped with one of four colors: from red (corrupt) to green (petty.)

Chanhee’s never received a human from red class: they leave those cases for the guardians. The worst he’s ever gotten is yellow class, where someone wanted him to strangle someone else’s grandfather because of some heritage or whatever. He didn’t read the file long enough to get completely associated with the details. Chanhee never likes the violent cases: he prefers to dip in, barcode the soul, dip back out.

When Chanhee hears the soft telltale thud of a file hitting his desk, he doesn’t even look up. He can feel Inseong lingering, waiting for a reaction. “No,” he says blankly, pushing back in his seat so he can slip his completed file in the duct.

“Youngbin’s orders,” Inseong says with about the same amount of enthusiasm. He’s one of the newer crossroad demons.

“He can suck an order out of my asshole. Did you see the file I just turned in? That’s my eighth one this week. I need a fucking day off.” Chanhee slouches back in his seat, fixing the younger demon with a glare. Inseong’s gripping a paper cup in one hand, the letters INSEONG <3 written in sharpie on the side. “I’m sorry. Did you get _me_ a coffee?”

“Says it’s a special case.” Inseong turns his face from Chanhee to the coffee, and then protectively hides it behind his back. “It’s hot chocolate.”

Well, that’s a new one. Youngbin’s prone to feeding Chanhee nonsensical excuses, but this one takes him by surprise. Special case? That shit doesn’t exist, solely due to the fact that there isn’t a human on that entire planet to fit such a designated role. Humans aren’t shit.

Still, Chanhee lets his eyes graze over to the file. It looks rather empty, and it’s absent of a class stamp. In fact, the entire folder itself is peculiarly bare, sporting nothing but the human’s name: Kim Seokwoo, and a sticky note that says nothing but _tagged for chanhee._

He doesn’t really like seeing his own name alongside a human’s, kinda feels like an obligation to serve them. Chanhee grips the note between his thumb and index finger and peels it off, grimacing like he’s touching a diaper full of shit as he tosses it into the bin under his desk.

“It doesn’t have a stamp,” Chanhee says, as if it’s not obvious enough already. “How am I supposed to approve the case if I don’t even know what class it is?”

Inseong can give him nothing but a shrug. “He said it was pretty important. Like, not incredibly important, but still kinda important.”

Chanhee stares, blankly. Inseong reaches over then to pat him on the shoulder, smiling uselessly as he retreats. Even though he’s been around it for years now, Chanhee still isn’t quite used to watching someone dissipate right before his eyes. No matter how many times he sees it, it’s still a bit unnerving. Inseong’s there, but when Chanhee blinks, he isn’t anymore.

Whatever. It’s probably a good thing, anyway. Inseong’s useless in this situation.

The file contains only a few pages. Despite being impossibly empty inside, there’s a cover page, thankfully, complete with a picture of the subject and basic information. Chanhee skims over it all somewhat carelessly - why should he care about the human’s criminal record, they’re reaching out to a fucking _demon_ \- but there are a few columns that stick out.

For one, Kim Seokwoo is young. Younger than any of the subjects Chanhee’s been given before, undoubtedly. He has quite a few friends and is attending one of the top universities in the district. But next to his request, it says _wants a demon to kill someone for him. **Ask Chanhee_

*

“He’s a fucking _cellist._ Why the fuck does he want someone dead when he plays a string instrument for a living? Aren’t musicians supposed to be, like, one of the calmest types of people?”

“I’ve told you several times already.” Youngbin sighs from where he’s seated in front of his laptop, head buried in his hands. For good reason. Chanhee decided to burst into his office about twenty minutes ago to try and get himself out of the case, and it chewed well through Youngbin’s lunch break. Five minutes past, and Chanhee’s still waving the file in his face. “We got no other information other than that.”

“How the hell did you not get any other information? I’ve never gotten a file like this before. Like- okay, look. Next to _family members,_ it says that both of his parents are still alive.”

Youngbin stares, thoroughly spent. “And?”

“Why does he want someone to _die_ when he’s got it made? He should be worried about tuition and shit, not summoning a demon and getting a one-way ticket to hell as soon as he kicks the bucket.”

“Oh, that’s another thing I forgot to mention. This case is to be viewed as a favor, not a request.”

Chanhee doesn’t have a coherent response to this. He seats himself on the edge of Youngbin’s desk and simply gapes at him, confusion painted vividly across his features. A favor? When has a demon ever owed a human a favor? This goes against everything Chanhee’s ever been taught.

So the subject isn’t getting barcoded? He won’t lose his soul when he dies? He’s still going to heaven after asking a demon to commit a murder for him? Has this ever happened before?

“Chanhee, it’s literally one of the easiest cases you’ve ever received. Is it not? You’ve killed people before, haven’t you?”

“I don’t like killing people,” Chanhee replies, his shoulders tense. “You know I don’t like doing shit like this.”

Youngbin nods at this like it’s common knowledge, but then he says, “based on the subject’s information, higher demons determined that you would be most suitable for the position. You died when you were attending university. You’re around the same age, give or take a few years. Your personalities are predicted to match up.” He pauses, warily. “You played the keyboard while you were still alive.”

“I don’t _remember_ how to _play_ it. What, I could play _Waltz of the Sugarplum Fairies_ so that means I’m most qualified to dump someone’s organs from their- Youngbin, I don’t even know how difficult the case is predicted to be. There’s no class.”

“That did come up in conversation,” Youngbin mumbles, “momentarily. The truth is, nobody knows how difficult the case will prove to be, since this subject is so unlike the others. Personally, I don’t think it’s anything you can’t handle. You’ve strangled an innocent old man, for christ sake.”

“I didn’t _want_ to-”

“It’s too puzzling for any of the new crossroad demons to take on,” Youngbin continues as if Chanhee isn’t even there, “and the subject’s personality won’t sync up with any of the guardians. We’re too corrupt for him.”

“You say that, but he…” Chanhee jostles the file, eyes wild, “he’s the one who wants someone _dead,_ Youngbin.”

“That doesn’t change the higher demons selection.”

Chanhee sighs in frustration. This is true. No matter what Chanhee tries to say to get himself out of this situation, the highers decision still stands. It overrides everything else in the books, including rhyme or reason. “Why are they considering this a favor, then? It’s unlike the highers to decide something like that.”

“Oh,” Youngbin tsks, waving a hand in the air, “you know. Some coincidence in the bloodline. One of his great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandparents was the murder target of a crossroad demon who fucked up the task, was pitied by this twelve-times grandparent, wouldn’t have made it back to hell safely if it weren’t for them. You know, the type.”

“I don’t,” Chanhee whispers, starting to feel like he’s going insane. “I don’t know the type. That story didn’t make any sense to me.”

“Well, it’s none of your concern. That’s probably why.”

“No, it’s because you’re fucking awful at explaining things. This is why I almost fell into the death chamber during my second week of training. You told me the lever was, “like, somewhere near the top,” and when I went to close the gap, I misjudged the distance because the lever was actually right next to-”

“What’s past is past,” Youngbin finalizes. He reaches over to tap his index finger against the file, and- “Now, we have to work on getting you prepped.”

*

Seokwoo meets Kang Chanhee on a Friday. 

Or, the last normal day of his life. 

He wakes up to his cat sprawled out across his face, scrambles out of bed once he realizes he hasn’t heard his alarm. His classes run late into the evening, and Juho cancels practice because he says he has a doctor’s appointment he can’t afford to miss.

When Seokwoo is tripping over himself to catch the last bus home, his phone chimes from his jacket.

**taeyang sent you a photo.**

**you**  
_is that_

**taeyang**  
_juho_  
_lying drunk on the pool table at west’s?_  
_absolutely_

**you**  
_so he didn’t have a doctor’s appt at all_  
_he just ditched my competition to play pool with mingyu and sanghyuk_  
_please don’t tell me you’re at the bar too_

**taeyang**  
_NO LMAO_  
_i got the pic from youngkyun_  
_why would i be at west’s this late at night_

**you**  
_what the fuck are u talking about_  
_it’s 8:30_

**taeyang**  
_past my bedtime bitch_

So the thing is, there shouldn’t have been a way for anybody to get inside Seokwoo’s apartment. He’s sure he locked all the windows this morning before he left, and the lock is still turned when he rifles through his bag for his keys. 

And when he drops his backpack off in his room, he spots nothing out of the ordinary there, either. Scotch is sound asleep on his bed, the fat little thing curled up right next to his pillows. He doesn’t stir once, not as Seokwoo tosses his textbooks onto the mattress, not as Seokwoo grabs clean clothes, and not as Seokwoo dips out to take a shower.

It’s all completely normal until it isn’t.

Seokwoo gets out of the shower at nine forty-five, pours Scotch a bowl of food and only finds it slightly odd when he doesn’t see the cat waddling around the corner. He leaves it on the counter and wanders back to his room, reaching up to scrub a towel through his wet hair.

“Are you really that sleepy?” He’s asking as he pushes past the door to his once empty bedroom, forever shattering the border between lunacy and normalcy. There’s a faint buzz from his fan in the corner, his textbooks are still lying unbothered on the bed, but-

Seokwoo pauses, feet stuttering on the carpet.

There’s someone standing in the middle of his bedroom. It’s scary enough in itself, but what really gets Seokwoo is the way Scotch is perched at the end of the bed. Fur standing on end, fangs pulled back in a terrifying hiss that Seokwoo’s never seen or heard before. 

The guy looks almost bored, glancing at the cat through lethargic brown eyes. He’s wrapped in a dark red sweatshirt, brown curly hair tickling the bridge of his eyebrows. There’s a single dangly black earring looped through his left ear, freckles painted across the slope of his nose. And there’s some scarlet tint to the area below his eyes, like he hasn’t slept in ages.

They stand like that for a while, the guy flicking his head around to face Seokwoo as he stumbles dumbly into the room. Seokwoo doesn’t know whether to scream, or cry, or demand who this person is, or how he got in Seokwoo’s home.

So he resorts to all four, letting out a bloodcurdling shriek that causes the neighbors to turn their lights on. The guy jumps a little in surprise, looking worriedly from Seokwoo to the window.

“Who the _fuck-_ ”

“I can explain,” the guy says calmly, hands raised in what’s probably supposed to look like some form of peace. This only makes Seokwoo scream louder, shaky hands finding his phone in his sweatpants.

“Are you one of Juho’s friends? How did you get into my house?”

“Please stop screaming-”

“How did you get into my house?”

“I teleported,” the guy says, 

“Oh, my god,” Seokwoo whispers, eyes growing impossibly wide. “Oh my god. You’ve escaped from some sort of mental institution, is that it? Why me? God-”

“What? No, no, you don’t understand, I’m-”

“I’m calling the police,” he sobs, sweaty fingers slipping on the screen. “I’m gonna- gonna call the police, so you stay right there, and-”

“You can’t, uh, do that-”

“FUCK you-”

“Kim Seokwoo, if you don’t calm down in the next five seconds, I’m going to have to take precauti- pre-”

“Precautionary,” Seokwoo fills in, finger pausing before it can complete the call to 911.

“Precautionary,” the guy repeats, shooting Seokwoo a dark, disapproving look. “Precautionary measures. I knew that.”

“Then why did you stutter?”

There’s a brief pause, as if time has decided to stop wholly inside the silence of Seokwoo’s bedroom. The world continues to turn outside, moon tilting in the darkness of the night sky. Everything falls to a hush, the stranger’s eyes narrowing even further, dark slits zeroed in on Seokwoo and his useless, shaky hands.

Then he cocks his head just faintly to the left, and time catches up to the gap it left behind. It moves a bit too quickly for Seokwoo, who loses his footing. As the floor rushes to meet him, he hears the faint thud of his phone hitting the carpet.

*

As Seokwoo squints against the dim light of his desk lamp, the blurry silhouette of a brown-haired stranger slowly begins to melt into view. “What… wha’ happened…”

“You fainted,” comes the stranger’s voice, deadpan and eerily casual. “Well, actually. You went unconscious. Which was completely my doing. At first, I thought you went into a coma when you hit your head off the table leg, so I had to pour water over your unresponsive body. When that didn’t work, I went into your kitchen and tried to feed you cat food-”

“Hold on,” Seokwoo cuts in, making a time-out motion with his hands. “How the fuck do you figure it was _your_ doing? That’s realistically impossible. And I still- I still don’t know how you got into my house… why do I smell tuna?”

“I can do it again,” the guy says almost excitedly, clicking his head just slightly to the left. “Humans are so easy to manipulate. Of course, I don’t know if you’re going to wake up again, that’s-”

“Please don’t,” Seokwoo coughs, sitting up so he can squint at the guy. “Did you actually teleport into my house?”

“Yes.”

“There isn’t a guy from Buzzfeed hiding in my closet with a big recording camera or anything, right?”

“No,” the guy responds, but he fixes the closet with a suspicious glare anyway. “At least, I don’t think so. But I don’t know what you do in your free time. Your folder didn’t say anything about that, anyway.”

“My f-...” Seokwoo rubs his temples, exasperated. “Who are you?”

“Kang Chanhee.”

“Okay.” A pause. “Are you an angel, or something? Why do I have a folder?”

“Fuck no,” Chanhee snorts, waving his hand dismissively. “I’m a demon.”

“A de-”

“Before you freak out again, I’m just a crossroads demon. I’m not some, like, all-powerful and all-knowing Satan who keeps fingers in a jar or anything. I’m, like, nothing in the eyes of hell. I’m kinda like, a guardian demon, but I’m not good enough for that title so they made me do favors for humans instead.”

“So, like, the Walmart version.”

Chanhee’s face scrunches up in confusion. “What?”

“Nothing.” Seokwoo shakes his head, pulling his legs to his chest. “How do I know you’re a real demon?”

“I have a card,” Chanhee explains, already reaching into his sweatshirt pouch. Before he can pull anything out, Seokwoo raises a hand, halting his movements. “What? It’s cool. It has fire on it.”

“Why are you here?” Seokwoo asks carefully. He swallows around a sudden lump in his throat. “Are you going to take me to hell or something?”

Chanhee shakes his head, narrowing his eyes when Seokwoo’s shoulders sink in relief. “I’m here to help you accomplish the task you asked for. Nothing else.”

What? Seokwoo feels his face twist in utter confusion. “Task? I didn’t- I think you have the wrong person. I didn’t stand at any sort of sign in the darkness and wave a torch and perform any sort of ritual. I mean, like, maybe once at boy scouts, but that was like, ten years ago and I’m pretty sure that wasn’t-”

“You’re Kim Seokwoo, right?” Chanhee asks, rudely interrupting him. He takes a seat on the edge of the bed, flipping through a file that Seokwoo’s positive wasn’t present a few seconds ago. Scotch takes a few startled steps back, ears flattening when Chanhee’s dark eyes lock on him. “Celloist, your mom and dad are still very much alive, one time you tried to see if you could stick your entire foot in your mouth-”

“Which I _didn’t,_ ” Seokwoo exclaims, not only in embarrassment but also a little regret. “How do you know that?”

“I told you.” Chanhee shuts the folder with a brisk _snap._ “I was assigned to help you complete a task. And the whole ritual thing? Severely outdated. I’m offended you would even suggest such a thing. Nobody does that anymore.”

“Then what task…”

With a huff, Chanhee reopens the folder. He skims through a few loose pages, index finger making its way down as he searches for a certain section. “Let’s see… oh, okay. Right here. According to the higher demons - they’re like, our God or whatever, even though the concept of such is arbitrary and nothing but an idealized manifestation of…” He glances over at Seokwoo, whose eyes are totally blank of recognition, “...nevermind. But according to them, you wanted someone named… is it Baek Juho? Dead.”

Seokwoo’s blood turns to ice.

“I- what? I mean, I do, like, fantasize about killing him sometimes, yeah, but I don’t-” A dry, nervous laugh. “I don’t actually want him, like, dead.”

“You don’t need to worry about serving time,” Chanhee tells him, as if that’s the most pressing concern. “The higher demons told us that I wasn’t supposed to barcode you when I’m finished here. Your great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-”

 _What-_ “Where did you even read that I requested Juho’s death?”

“You texted your friend Yoo Taeyang.”

“You read my text messages?” Seokwoo looks around frantically for his phone, eyes stretched comically wide. “That’s an invasion of privacy!”

“I’m a fucking _demon,_ Seokwoo.”

“Yeah, well…” Seokwoo pushes himself to his feet, anxiously crossing his arms. “I don’t want him dead. I was in a state of anger when I sent that text. So you can, like, go back to hell or wherever it is you came from.”

Chanhee squints. “I can’t go back until I’ve completed my mission.”

“Yes, you can. I’m telling you that you’ve completed your mission. Go home.”

“But I didn’t.”

“I’m saying that you did.”

“No, I mean, I literally haven’t completed it.” Chanhee waves the folder pointedly. “I physically can’t go home until I’ve completed what was written on this paper. Trust me, if it was up to me, I’d be curled up in bed marathoning Golden Girls and taking the next two weeks off.”

“You guys have Golden Girls down there?”

“Yes, Seokwoo,” Chanhee sighs, “hell does indeed have cable. It’s just like Earth, except it’s, like, a bit warmer. And louder, depending on which people are getting tortured that day.”

Seokwoo stares at him in horror. “Please go home.”

“I can’t. I need to accomplish my mission.”

“But I don’t _want_ you to complete your mission!” Seokwoo whines, throwing his hands in the air. “I just want to be left alone so I can study and eat homemade mac n’ cheese in peace! Wait… Seokwoo, he can’t bother you if you act like he isn’t there.”

“Are you talking to yourself?” Chanhee stares incredulously. “I can hear everything you’re saying.”

“Funny because I can’t hear you, considering you’re not even there.”


End file.
